Vicuña

Vicuña represents the extreme end of Cariaggi’s work with noble fibres and expertise. At roughly 12–13 microns, the fibre is finer than conventional cashmere, extraordinarily scarce, and too valuable to compensate for poor processing later. Working with it requires restraint. Preserving its extraordinary natural softness and lightness is most important and must be protected in practice, rather than manufactured with aggressive finishing. Its ability to handle this expensive fibre without losing the qualities that justify its price points speaks to the mill’s capabilities.

Cariaggi ensures that the spinning and finishing processes they use respect the fibre’s structure, so their vicuña retains its unique tactile and insulating qualities. As a result of its careful processing, Cariaggi’s vicuña yields exceptional “second-skin” comfort that is highly sought after. Their offering is more “mill-centric,” focused on spinning excellence. It’s not surprising that Cariaggi pure vicuña yarn and garments are priced at the very top of luxury textile markets. Strict wildlife protection and CITES regulations limit annual vicuña production to a few thousand kilograms globally, and the wool comes from protected, free-ranging stock under careful regulation, not from domesticated herds like alpacas or cashmere goats. Community conservation programs shear the animals on-site, as part of their natural lifecycle.

If we’re going to make one of the world's rarest and finest natural fibres into our own knitwear designs, it makes little sense to compromise where we get it from or how our partner supplier works with the raw material. Cariaggi combines its access to vicuña with decades of spinning experience. As a mill, they have the precise skill set to turn these delicate, precious fibres into yarn, where small decisions in processing have enormous consequences. Vicuña provides the raw material, and Cariaggi ensures we retain the natural qualities that make it so precious in the first place, so we can see our pieces come to life in partnership with our Umbrian knitwear workshop who also know how to handle this material, and treat it with the reverence it deserves.